Sunday, October 13, 2013

More on Perry Mason

I can't believe I'm writing a second post about Perry Mason, I never even watched this show. But, there's a marathon on the Hallmark Movie channel, so I have it on in the background.

A pleasure in watching old shows is the parade of familiar character actors. Perry Mason though goes so far back I don't even recognize most of the guest stars (though I did catch a very young Louise Fletcher. Who knew she was a hottie at one point?)

Two things common in every episode, Perry always gets the killer to confess on the stand, and the last five minutes is Perry, Della, and one of the police detectives sitting back in Perry's office and explaining everything to the audience. The Denoument.

The killer confessing on the stand thing though is of course thoroughly crazy, killers rarely ever confess and if they do, they never confess on the stand. Ever ever.

So for Perry Mason to grill a suspect and make him confess on the stand, I suppose is OK for '60s audiences. But something like that would never get by modern audiences.